On Human Rights Day, Call for an End to Violence against Women and Download Public Education Tools

We're drawing close to the end of the year, and like many others, we at MADRE have been looking back on everything that 2010 has been.  We've supported the struggle of our sister organization in Haiti to protect women against sexual violence in the displacement camps in the aftermath of the earthquake.  We've partnered with human rights advocates in Colombia who have demanded an end to the use of child soldiers.  We've strategized with the leaders of a women farmers' union in Sudan to push for fairer and more effective global food aid policies.

The list goes on, and our work will continue and grow in 2011.  Today is Human Rights Day, a chance for us to celebrate these and other tireless efforts of advocates worldwide to build a world based on human rights. Every year, Human Rights Day is celebrated on the 10th of December to commemorate the United Nations' adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948. This landmark document was the among the first global efforts to officially recognize the human rights to which all people are entitled.

December 10th also marks the end of the 16 Days of Activism Against Gender Violence, a campaign sparked by the Center for Women's Global Leadership (CWGL).  This annual event begins on November 25 (International Day Against Violence Against Women) and calls for the elimination of all forms of gender-based violence.

In recognition of both Human Rights Day and the end of the 16 Days of Activism Against Gender Violence, we are releasing a series of public education materials. These highlight the many threats women around the world continue to face--but they also uplift the multitude of ways women have struggled to demand their human rights and to live a life free of violence.  (Click on the thumbnail images at left to open a printable PDF version of the flyers -- and share them with your friends!)